"The House That Built Me" | ||||||||
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Single by Miranda Lambert | ||||||||
from the album Revolution | ||||||||
Released | March 8, 2010 | |||||||
Format | Music download | |||||||
Recorded | 2009 | |||||||
Genre | Country | |||||||
Length | 3:56 | |||||||
Label | Columbia Nashville | |||||||
Writer(s) |
Tom Douglas Allen Shamblin |
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Producer(s) |
Frank Liddell Mike Wrucke |
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Miranda Lambert singles chronology | ||||||||
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"The House That Built Me" is a song written by Tom Douglas and Allen Shamblin, and recorded by American country music artist Miranda Lambert. Blake Shelton was originally set to record the song but when Lambert heard it, she immediately wanted to record it for herself. It was released in March 2010 as the third single from her third studio album, Revolution. It is the fastest-rising single of her career, reaching the Top 20 in its eighth week. For the chart week of June 12, 2010, the song became Lambert's first Number One hit on the U.S. Billboard Hot Country Songs chart, and held its place at the top for four consecutive weeks. Additionally, it was her second single to receive a platinum certification from the RIAA on January 31, 2011.
Lambert performed the song during the 2010 Academy of Country Music Awards on April 18, 2010, and received a standing ovation. At the 53rd Annual Grammy Awards on February 13, 2011, she won a Grammy for Best Female Country Vocal Performance for "The House That Built Me."
"The House That Built Me" is a country ballad in the key of F major driven primarily by acoustic guitar with steel guitar fills. The song's female narrator describes returning, as an adult, to the house that she grew up in, and asking the person who now lives in the house if she could step inside and take a look around. She refers to it as "the house that built [her]," because of all the memories that she had of growing up within its walls. It is also Miranda's first single of her career that she did not have a hand in writing.
Allen Shamblin based the song on his experiences going back to the house in Huffman, Texas that he grew up in at least once a year.
The song received critical acclaim. Matt Bjorke described the song favorably in his review of Revolution, referring it as "one of the absolute best songs on the record." He notes that while it could've been "a bombastic, overdone song," Lambert and her producers kept it "earthy and just downright beautiful." Bjorke later reviewed the single itself, describing it as a "song that plays on the country cliché of nostalgia without ever feeling cliché" and concluded that it stands a good chance of nomination in the 2010 CMA Awards. Blake Boldt of Engine 145 gave the song a thumbs up, favoring Lambert's preference in "organic storytelling instead of contrived commercial jingles." He described the song itself as "a gorgeous piece of melancholy country without getting squishy or sentimental" and called it an "early favorite for single of the year." Dan Milliken of Country Universe gave the song an A rating, describing it favorably as "the best on the album" and a standout for radio, because of "its grace and intelligence, not because it happens to be more disposably catchy than the others surrounding it."